One year of dreams about the battle of Gotham, eleven months dreaming about what happened to her missing brother, two months of dreaming about the battle against Gaea, and six whole years since the dreams—no, nightmares—about my encounter with the Minotaur began. She’s. so. Fucking. Tired.

“Pandora, Pandora! Come on, you can sleep in the library. I need to study.”

Groaning, she rubbed her blue eyes and sent the nastiest glare she could muster with so little sleep Percy’s way.

“I’m up, fish breath, don’t worry.” A very not-awake girl grumbled, grabbing her bag and slipping it over her shoulder and getting out of Paul’s car.

One perk of your stepdad being a teacher at Gotham Academy was the rides to school instead of walking or the bus. The downside was having to get there ridiculously early and all the rich kids with their perfect polished accents, while Pandora was over here with a clear Crime Alley accent.

Dragging her feet, she stuck close to her brother's side even though it was way too early for any of the usual characters to be here bothering her. Since everyone here was wealthy and dramatic, she had to make sure to really keep her temper in check. Not to mention she didn’t particularly want her stepdad to lose his job with her mom pregnant.

“Are you sure you even know how to read these books, seaweed brain?” she huffed as she held the pile of ridiculously heavy textbooks Percy was piling into her arms. Just because she had muscle didn’t mean she wanted to use it so early in the morning without stretching.

“Shut up, kelp face, and just put them on the desk and leave before deciding to distract me,” her brother responded with a playful nudge as he sat down, only holding one textbook.

“Of course, wouldn’t want to distract you from studying one page then spending the rest of your time dreaming about a certain Annabeth.” The blonde responded with a laugh as she put the textbooks down and turned away into the maze of shelves.

Stretching her arms, she browsed the shelves like her dyslexic ass would actually read. Scoffing at the thought of actually reading something that wasn’t in Greek, she grabbed a book and flipped through it just for the fantasy of being a normal fifteen-year-old girl and not a descendant of Poseidon.

“Damian, stop hiding,” Pandora said, not even having to look up to know the Wayne boy was behind the shelf to the side of her. Being friends with a certain son of death helped her sense someone creeping up. Ever since last year when Percy went missing, she and Damian struck up a weird sort of, as he called it, mutually beneficial acquaintance. Dork.

“Tt. I was not ‘hiding,’ Jackson, I was merely observing.” His polished, yet not entirely obnoxious voice rang out as he stepped forward.

As usual, he looked like nothing less than perfection. If she didn’t know any better, she’d think he was an Aphrodite kid, but all Waynes had ridiculously good genes. To be adopted by Bruce Wayne you had to be supermodel-worthy, so it made sense his biological son was so enamoring.

“I’m not a monkey in a zoo, I don’t need observing. It’s not like I grew a tail over the summer,” Pandora huffed as she slipped the book back into place and followed Damian as he moved to sit at one of the tables and slid into the chair across from him.

“I can never be too certain with you,” he replied dryly as he opened up a big book and didn’t look up.

“Hey—! Wait, what’s that?” the girl asked, peering over at the sight of the big book, ever nosy. “Since when do you need to study biology? I thought you were a prodigy in everything?”

“I get excellent grades in all subjects, yes,” he replied smoothly, not taking his eyes off his book. “But I’m looking into biology because over the summer I volunteered at Gotham Hospital and have decided to pursue a future career in medicine.”

Letting out an impressed blow of air, Pandora leaned back in her seat, casually studying the boy in front of her. Of course, the billionaire, genius, and gorgeous boy just had to want to do something as noble as volunteer at the hospital and become a doctor. Before she could push further, he asked his own question.

“How was your summer camp?” Damian said, his deep green eyes finally sweeping her once over and settling on her face. Amazing deflecting as usual, but unfortunately she’d also have to deflect this question.

“Careful, Wayne, you’re almost crossing the line between friend and acquaintance territory,” the blonde said, keeping her own eyes level with his.

Before he could add his own snark into the mix or Pandora ran the risk of getting lost in the pool of green, the five-minute bell rang, causing her to sigh and stand up, grabbing her bag.